About Txotxfest

Txotxfest, Black Twig Cider House's Cider Festival!

Location: Black Twig Cider House

Day: Nov 18th 2017

Time: noon - 4pm

Hard Cider is made all over the world. It is our hope to showcase our local cidermakers and restaurants as well and offer you an opportunity to taste cider from all over the country and world.

Black Twig Cider House & Mattie B's Public House are joining with Presenting Sponsor Harris Distributing and with the help of spectacular vendors, chefs, and culinary artisans are making Txotxfest one for the books! Hold on to your txotx, and basque in the camaraderie of this day.

Presenting Sponsor: Harris Distributing

Cider Producers

Appalachian Mountain Cidery - Appalachian Mountain Brewery focuses on building relationships with the community, sustainable business practices and supporting local non-profits. They also really enjoy making great tasting award winning ciders.

Blackwater Cider - Authentic handcrafted dry hard cider, made with fresh NC apples. Made and distributed in North Carolina.

Bold Rock - With breweries on either side of the Blue Ridge mountains, this is the nation’s largest independently owned cider company that has won over 75 awards for their ciders.

Botanist and Barrel - From just north of us in Cedar Grove, NC. Specializing in whole fruit ferment.

Chatham Cider Works - Small-batch hard cider from North Carolina apples. The cider is dry and unfiltered. They work with apple growers in the mountains.

Daidala Ciders - An Asheville, North Carolina based company, designing both experimental and traditional styles of fermentation while constantly seeking influence from other industries and cultures.

De Maison Selections - Founded by Andre Tamers in 1996, De Maison Selections is an importing company that specializes in unique, high-quality, boutique wines, ciders and spirits from Spain and France.

Fishing Creek Cider - A very small craft cidery currently producing about 4,000 bottles of our unique hand-made sparkling hard cider each year in rural Edgecombe CountyGood Road Ciderworks - Cidery Based in Charlotte concentrating on single varietals apples from there area.

James Creek - James Creek Ciderhouse makes premium craft ciders from Southern heirloom and cider apple varieties grown in our orchards in Moore County, North Carolina They planted about 50 vintage apple trees in the winter of 2009 and now have about 7 acres with over 65 varieties of apples, including such Southern favorites as Kinnaird’s Choice, American Golden Russett, Red Limbertwig, Hewe’s Crab, Blacktwig, Stayman and Yates.

Reverend Nat's Hard Cider - As a die-hard craft beer revolutionary, I experimented with beer yeasts, wild fermentations, Belgian ale spices, aromatic west coast hops and local fruit juices. My search for superior ingredients to make unusual ciders was all-consuming. After making cider for nearly a decade, I concluded that, while apple-only ciders define cider for most of my fellow countrymen, my passion was in creative flavor combinations making cider in the spirit of craft beer geeks.

Shacksbury - At Shacksbury, we believe cider can, and should, be daring and complex. From gnarled trees on New England farmsteads to Old World orchards in England and Spain, our cider will change the way you think about this amazing fruit.

Urban Orchard Cider Co. and Bar - A local, family-owned hard cider production company and tasting room located in West Asheville, NC. One of only a handful of “True Cider Bars”in the nation.

Virtue Ciders - Founded by the former brewmaster of Goose Island Brewing Company. All-natural craft ciders made in Fennville, Michigan from 100% Michigan apples.

Beverage Providers-

Alley Twenty Six Tonic - Alley Twenty Six Tonic Syrup is made using the bark of a cinchona tree, from which quinine is sourced. Lemongrass, limes and sugar are added to create a tonic as robust in taste as it is in color. The intensity of the flavor allows you to have control over the kind of tonic libation you prefer.

Crude Bitters and Sodas - Their cocktail bitters and shrub syrup concentrates are hand-crafted by human hands. The ingredients are all natural and selection, preparation, maceration, bottling and labeling is done by hand.

Fair Game Beverage - a craft distillery rooted in our Southern home and inspired by the world’s classic spirits. Their rums and brandies are slowly fermented and carefully distilled on an alembic copper still before resting in bourbon oak barrels.

Ticket Prices:GA - $30 through October 17, $35 beginning October 18, and $40 the week before the event (includes tasting glass)VIP - $50 through October 17, $60 beginning October 18 (includes tasting glass, T-shirt and one -hour early access)

**All food and drink are included in both prices.**

FRIDAY NIGHT DINNER AT BLACK TWIG CIDER HOUSE

Friday, November 17th, we have organized a small cider pairing dinner with Steven Goff of Brinehaus. We will be offering a 5 course dinner with 5 fantastic cider pairings for only $50! We want you to know what cider and food can be together.

The Fantastic Five Course dinner will begin at 7pm at Black Twig Cider House. **Everything is Gluten Free!**[Please contact amy@blacktwigciderhouse.com with any additional food restrictions or concerns.]

See you at

Black Twig Cider House

About the Organizer

Mattie Beason & Amy Loria

A native of Durham, NC, Matthew Beason is an integral component of the rising culinary culture in his community. Attaining his certification in cider through Sicera, Beason continues to grow the expanding cider community with the opening of Black Twig Cider House.
“This passion for cider started ten years ago while traveling through the Basque region and experiencing not only the incredible varietals of ciders but also being a part of the communal aspect around the txotx, the cider barrel,” states Beason. “I knew I wanted to make that a part of the Durham community.”
Beason experienced a similar cultural revelation with wine while attending Kenyon College, attaining a degree in Philosophy and Business Ethics. Dining at L’Arpege in Paris, a Michelin three-star restaurant, Beason enjoyed a bottle of 1995 JL Chave Hermitage Blanc, revolutionizing his appreciation for wine and becoming a converted oenophile.
Upon graduation, Beason immersed himself into the burgeoning food scene of Durham, developing the wine program at Pop’s, a popular Italian eatery, and it’s sister restaurant, Nana’s, which earned the “Award of Excellence” from The Wine Spectator. In 2007, Beason branched out with his own wine concept, Six Plates, a wine-pairing restaurant with a revolving menu around six different plates of food. Cited in The New York Times as one of the forbearers of Durham’s local culinary scene with his famous “lamby joe” sandwich, Beason illustrated in his first restaurant his adept leadership in the culinary evolution of his hometown.
A prominent food and beverage innovator, Beason continues to evolve his passion for pairing beverages with food, expanding the selection from wine to include cider and craft beers with the opening of Mattie B’s Public House in 2013 and his new Black Twig Cider House in the spring of 2016. Beason’s philanthropic ties to the community are vast and most notable with his participation in the Urban Ministries, helping to bring food, shelter and a future to the poor and homeless in Durham.